What have I learnt about technology?

I have already talked about the equipment, but I will briefly evaluate how well they performed.
The NikonD3200 exceeded any expectations I may of had. It is 24 megapixel and shoots in FULL HD. The quality of the shots were fantastic. However, the medium of which I shot through made a difference to its performance. For example, when I shot through the six inch bullet proof glass at The Shard to capture my time lapse the quality was reduced slightly. Another problem I had with the NIKON is the focus pull. I don't have the steadiest hands in the world, so when I attempted the focus pull in the very first scene after the time lapse, the camera shook a little. If I could repeat this task, I would invest in a remote or something that will change the focal length on the camera automatically to ensure a smooth focus pull.

The tripod was sufficient enough in all terrains. The biggest problem I faced with the tripod was when I was filming the murder scene. The ground was all wet mud and the tripod began to sink a little and wasn't very stable. I rectified this situation by placing some bricks that were near by under the tripod to secure it in place. This seemed to work fine. The stabiliser takes a while to fine tune. If the camera isn't calibrated on it perfectly, it becomes useless. So my only criticism I have of the stabiliser/steadicam is how long it took to set up.


The GOPRO HD BLACK EDITION, shoots in 4K. It is very small, smaller than I expected in fact it fits in the palm of a hand comfortably. This wasn't a problem, but what was, is the fact it did not have a screen or a peephole to view footage live. So this meant I had no idea what I had filmed until I reviewed it on a computer later. Also, I have mentioned this before but when it is designed to float in the event it is dropped underwater. Buoyancy meant that every time I dived to the bottom of the pool to get far beneath the victim floating, i would naturally float back up again. Juggling trying to dive and hold the camera, whilst looking at the actress and trying to judge where to place the camera because it had no screen was no easy feat.

There were several problems I faced with some of the footage, and I had to implement some editing genius to get away with it. Perhaps the most notable example of this was the Time Lapse which I mention in detail in a separate post.


EDITING SOFTWARE
To create my final piece I used both Final Cut Express 4 and Final Cut Pro. They are both hugely different. Final Cut Pro has an 'adobe' feel to it. It is more similar to adobe premiere than its predecessor. However, there were benefits to using Final Cut Pro.

For example, colour correcting in Final Cut Pro is far more advanced than Final Cut Express. When colour correcting the underwater footage, so that it looks more genuine Final Cut Pro was definitely the program of choice. One problem I had was alternating between the two. So eventually, I left Express behind and went all Pro. Express has some time consuming irritating qualities such as rendering all its footage, where as Final Cut Pro does not. So in my opinion Final Cut Pro was more time efficient.




















The editing of my piece is fairly simple. Jump Cuts and simple fades (in and out). Perhaps an interesting editing point was when I overlaid the P.O.V shot at the murder scene. That took time because I had to move than scale the close up of his face so that it would be harmonious with its background. See Below.    As you can see his face is in the middle of the screen and his eyes are on either side of the tree. They fit the shape of the background rather well. This was deliberate so the transition is just a little smoother and to really show how tormented the girl is by this murderer. It puts the murderer on a pedestal almost, making him appear omnipotent. Editing is so important in conveying character traits and personalities. For example, his fragile psyche is reflected in the jump cuts and hectic/quick transitions during the murder scene.

Garageband

I made a very elaborate soundtrack via garageband using a mixture of loops and short compositions for my first draft. Garageband can be very time consuming and requires a certain basic level of musical knowledge for a product of any quality to be made. I made the soundtrack from scratch and applied it to my first draft. However, upon heading the advice from colleagues and people who viewed the video, I changed it. Generally, the soundtrack was met with negative feedback. Due to time restriction, I had to download a royalty free soundtrack and apply it. So although I used Garageband for my first draft, I did not use it for my final product. 

How did I attract my audience?

I tried to vary my shots, so the piece doesn't become varying. I use several P.O.V shots so the audience can place themselves both in the main character's (murderer) position and in the victim's. This helps engage the audience with the thriller. Iconography is important in addressing and attracting my audience.

This will attract the young business professionals who are interested in my film and even people living in London. When the setting has been firmly established, people from that respective city are generally more inclined to see it. For example, Skyfall filmed all over the world deliberately to attract a larger audience. I have filmed in iconic parts of London, thus would expect a large proportion of my audience to be Londoners eager to see their city on film.



Emphasis on Male Psychotic
There isn't a strong emphasis on gender in my thriller, other than the fact that the protagonist is male. The emphasis revolves more around general mental health than anything else. The drugs in the beginning are indicative of someone who is mentally unstable and stressed, and so immediately the audience are captivated and want to watch more to delve even deeper in to this character's life.





Shock Moments
The murder scene in my thriller would appeal to hardcore thriller buffs. It is very quick and psychedelic and we are shown a close up of the killer's estranged face, that is overlaid over the murder scene. We are sown the murder of the girl in a quick succession of shots from different angles and then it ends with a point of view shot from the girl's perspective of her being strangled and eventually blacking out. Then we have a dramatic black screen followed by perhaps the most shocking segment of the murder clip, the girl's body floating underwater.

 The use of the quick cuts and close ups and build suspense and a heightened sense of tension. This is a thriller convention and common technique used to build up tension and suspense in thrillers. 

FRAMING 
The framing of every single shot in my thriller was crucial. I did not want to show the audience anything that could potentially be 'distracting'. The focus has to be on my protagonist, so that in the very early stages of the film we(the audience) have a firm connection with the main character. Even on the train, I ensure that I frame it so no one on the train other than him can be seen. I also utilise some camera movement like when he sees the dead girl at the train station and slowly reveal what he has just seen. This builds up suspense and shows that the audience what he can see and that only he can see her at the station, although this is implicitly implied.

The audience for my media product?

It is hard to say who my target audience will be and give a specific profile, because I think my thriller will appeal to a wide range of people. However, I think it will be most popular amongst two 'groups' of people;

Teenagers [13-17]

I am inclined not to say one gender will be more likely to enjoy my thriller than the other, but stereotypically I think because its set in Canary Wharf and my main character is male, there is a stronger chance that it will appeal more to males of this age range. My thriller is packed with action and a psychedelic/convoluted narrative and thus it will appeal more to the intellectual than anything. I think teenage boys will like the action aspect of it, and recently I believe there has been a revolution with respect to the kind of movie teenage boys are watching. Unusual thrillers are more interesting than the traditional hollywood story lines that even youngsters are getting tired of. Usually, when your main character is male, males will find it easier to connect with him and the same is true with females and female characters. I think because my main character is young and male, and obviously psychotic he will appeal to young males. A survey that was conducted showed that young men's favourite villainous persona in film is the Pyscopath, examples including Hannibal Lecter and Fight Club's Tyler Durden.

Young Business Professionals

Due to the amount of businessman iconography featured in the opening, it will appeal to people in a similar profession. Canary Wharf has a dominating presence in my opening which is generally considered to be the London's business hub, and generally represents the London economy and London's flourishing business world. Usually when a film portrays a certain kind of person, for example, a businessman or woman or a civil worker, people in that profession are more inclined to watch the movie to see how their profession has been portrayed on screen. This logic would dictate that businessmen are likely to watch my thriller. This is good because it is a very broad category and will result in a bigger audience which means better yield at the box office. 

Movies similar to mine:  

• Fargo
• Memento
• Enemy
• Pulp Fiction
• Silence of the Lambs

My thriller features a lot of elements from some of the thrillers above. For example, we have a psychologically disturbed main character, a convoluted narrative and complex chronology. The films above appeal to almost everyone, but predominately males aged 15-25. 

Distributing My Media Product - Institution and why?

Representation of Social Groups

The Characters;
The main character is an alpha-male young adult who woks in the business world. The business world is being represented through Canary Wharf, both on the picture of the left and in the time lapse in the beginning and his young age is being shown through the red iPad primarily. There are other means for the audience to gauge that the main character is in his early twenties, such as the fact that he is in a suit, that he is travelling alone on the train and that he appears to live alone.

My other character, who plays the role of victim is far more mysterious. We can see based on her attire and height and general look that she is a young female, aged somewhere between seven and twelve.








Racial Stereotyping

Both the victim and the attacker seem to be of a similar racial/ethnic background. This was important to me because statistics show that most murderers or serial killers operate within their own race. Thus conveying this was important to me, as I wanted my thriller opening to be as representative of the real world as possible. Also, I  did not want the murder to seem racially motivated, as that has nothing to do with the narrative.



Criminal - Victim Dynamic/Relationship

I have gone for a classic portrayal of victim and attacker, in the respect that my victim is a young helpless female, whilst the attacker is an older more aggressive male. My media product therefore portrays women as passive and male as dominant and active. This is an old-fashioned view on gender relationships in the film world of crime, but is one that is still shown in a lot of modern thrillers.

In the frame above, the 'helpless little girl' is being strangles and effectively KILLED by the crazed male. This is a stereotype within film, but one I have deliberately played up to.

Developing/Challenging conventions of real media products.

Most thriller openings will revolve around narrative or a particular character or both. For my opening, I really wanted to focus on the main character and really get across to the audience how disturbed he is.

FRAME 1

The first frame is a time lapse of London with Canary Wharf in the distance. This is integral to the overall narrative because my main character, who the audience 'meet' in the next frame has a job there. The iconic buildings and Tower Bridge in the bottom left corner of the frame, firmly establishes the setting as London. The time lapse also signifies a chance in chronology, suggesting that the narrative will take place over more than one day. 

FRAME 2 

This frame shows my main character out of focus, whilst the focus  is on the drugs in the. There is a short focus pull and my main character becomes the focal point of the shot. However, showing the drugs early on is very important. Firstly, it suggests my character is unstable mentally. The cinematic thriller audience is trained to associate drugs with mental instability and contempt. Our prejudices kick in and we start to make assumptions about this character- his wellbeing, his mental disposition etc. I would say this is a device used within the genre of thriller frequently- using mise en scene to suggest or imply things about a character. In this respect I would say I have definitely developed conventions of real media products. Using drugs to define my character is fairly common and effective and does not 'challenge' conventions of media product. 

In terms of the editing my thriller perhaps challenges conventions of real media products. There are several jumps in chronology, that I have decided to show through the use of jump cuts and through subtle wardrobe changes. The most poignant on screen suggestion of a jump in chronology is the character shaving his moustache. It's not something that perhaps is very striking or indeed that obvious, but that was the intention. My thriller is one that engages with the audience deeply through forcing them to follow the narrative. I view my thriller as more of a 'film' than a piece of 'entertainment' unlike most modern thrillers. This is a confusing concept, but what I mean is most thrillers are made as pieces of entertainment and not as film in the artistic sense of the word. Memento for example, is a thriller that engages with its audience and is a proper 'film'. In this respect, where I have tried to chronologise my thriller in a different way to the 'traditional thriller chronology paradigm', I would say I am challenging thriller conventions. 

GENRE?

My opening is definitely a thriller. It revolves around a crime. We meet the perpetrator of this crime who is obviously a criminal- it is implied he is suffering from some form of psychosis. There is camera movement. There is a feeling of anxiety, unease even. My opening conforms to the codes and conventions of a thriller film. However, there are elements of horror in my opening. I have in a way fuse the two genres together. I will explore these scenes in more detail;

The scene where there is a slow reveal of the girl at the train station and then we jump cut to a closer shot of her is very horror like. It seems that no one on the platform can see her except him and at this point in the film, it is unclear if she is actually there or if she is a fragment of his memory. 

The mise en scene in this shot contributes to the "horror feel" of it. The lighting was very hard to achieve, but I positioned her deliberately in such a way that half of her face would be in the shadows. The wind happened to blow fortuitously when I hit record and her skirt and top blow in the wind as she stands there stationary, making the shot all the more eerie. At this point we do not know if she is a victim or some spirit that it haunting our main character. Although this is made clear later when we see her get drowned by him. This shot develops psychological/horror/thriller conventions through its mise en scene and camera work. 

The shot of her underwater, after it has been colour corrected (as shown below), again perhaps fits into the thriller horror sub genre as it is has the shock value you'd expect in a horror, but builds the tension you would expect in a thriller. 

The focus is around her eyes here and her lifeless body. 

Overall, I would say my thriller both challenges and develops conventions of traditional thriller. As I have already alluded to, my thriller is most different from real media product in its unconventional editing, but is similar to real media product in its use of camera movement, and framing of shots to suggest and imply and show things to the audience. 

Filming Underwater

For my thriller, I wanted a shot of my victim underwater. The purpose of the shot is to make the thriller opening more exciting with a variety of shots and to show my victim lifeless underwater. However, filming underwater at the actual location (as shown on left) was impractical for several reasons. Firstly, the water was extremely cold meaning myself and the actor wouldn't be able to stay in there for long. Also, the lighting underwater because it is so murky, is very poor. This meant that the footage would be terrible and the lighting would be too low for the NIKON D3200 to record high quality film. The solution was to film in a tank/swimming pool where lighting is far better and alter the shot in post-production to make it look it actually happened in the murky lake.





For the underwater footage, organisation was important. Many local swimming pools said no! The main reason for this was because, filming isn't generally permitted in public pools. Also, a lot of pools have stringent policies on entering the pool with non-swimwear clothing. I rang up a large number of swimming pools, utilising Google to find local pools.












Literally all the pools in Harrow, of which there aren't many, said no to the filming.

I decided to extend my search to Brent and eventually found a place that were willing to allow the filming as long as it was after hours. The place is VALE FARM SPORTS CENTRE. I filmed at 10pm and got a variety of shots using the GOPRO HD BLACK EDITION.

A problem with filming was actually trying to swim underwater, whilst keeping the camera stable under the victim. The camera itself is designed to float as a safety precaution incase it is dropped underwater, which meant I couldn't leave the camera on the swimming pool floor. I managed to get the shot in the end, so it all worked out, but it wasn't the easiest shot to film.

Time Lapse Fix

This is the time lapse, the final product that will be used in my Thriller video. 

MAJOR COMPLICATIONS

Due to the fact that I had to film through glass due to security restrictions at The View from the Shard, it was almost inevitable that there would be glare and reflection of those inside. The top left corner of my shot showed people walking inside the viewing area. However, with a bit of editing prowess I was able to resolve what would have been three hours of wasted footage. 

How I resolved the issue?

The top right corner of the shot was fine, in fact the skyline colours captured were beautiful in the top right corner. I created a duplicate of the shot and applied the flop effect, which essentially mirrors the shot. I then cropped it so that only the sky was being mirrored and not the city, otherwise I'd have a very weird looking city. This duplicate was being overlaid on the original. I then feathered the edges   so that it one couldn't see the line where the skyline met the city. What resulted was a beautifully majestic symmetrical sky with no reflection in the top left corner. What was a little challenging was adjusting the crop and feathering so that it would match perfectly and blend in with the original in the background. 

THRILLER PRELIMINARY- Reservoir Dogs Recreation

This is the Preliminary and below is everything prior to being able to create this recreation of the opening to Reservoir Dogs.






Planning Stage:

The very first thing I had to do in order to recreate the opening to Quentin Tarentino's legendary film is actually watch it. Upon watching it several times, I noted the types of shots I would have to execute, the amount of actors I would require, type of locations  and every other little detail. This is what I came up with.

Actors

The opening sequence of Reservoir Dogs has a total of 8 actors in it and six of them are dressed in sharp black suits. The other two are wearing different clothing; Chris Penn is wearing a retro style American jacket  and the other is wearing a black shirt without a blazer. So immediately I had to start gathering the actors because I knew this would logistically be very hard given the short time frame.

Filming Locations:

Finding the right location for each shot replication was paramount. The majority of the opening revolves around a tall brick wall. This was hardest to find. Rather than physically go scouting with the crew around Harrow to find a suitable wall, I utilised Google Maps's street view with a little local knowledge and after about ten minutes of digitally surfing the streets of Harrow I came across this.

I decided this would be ideal as the road itself was quiet and was wide enough to get the tracking shot.

Also I had intended to use a place I knew near Harrow Bus Station for the last scene of the opening but whilst actually filming, I stumbled upon what I saw as a better location so decided to film there instead.

Storyboard: 

Storyboarding was integral for this task to ensure perfect execution because it was a recreation task and so I storyboarded the entire opening of Reservoir Dogs by taking screen grabs from Youtube of every shot of which they are a total of 11.

Props:

Props was important in making our recreation as close as possible to the actual thing. After going through the opening sequence countless times, I concluded I would need cigarettes, cigars and toothpicks and a gold chain worn by Chris Penn.

Equipment:

We ended up using two DSLR cameras; a sony and one NikonD3200, a tripod, a H1 Zoom (for the voiceover), an iPad and a car (Range Rover).

Execution/Filming Stage:

Filming this wasn't as easy as I had envisaged and I faced a number of last-minute problems. As I already mentioned the original had a total of eight actors but due to last minutes personal affairs, two actors who had agreed to be in the prelim pulled out on the morning and I took the decision to do it anyway, as I had six actors there all suited and booted and rescheduling wasn't feasible due to weather and limited time. I had to compromise and anyway, the show must always go on. We also didn't film the shots in the order they appear on screen but from most time consuming to the least time consuming. Furthermore, to the shoot I took an iPad with a downloaded copy of the opening of Reservoir Dogs which enabled me to watch the opening over and over and ensure things like framing was right and also as a guide to the actors.

Tracking Shot:

This was definitely the hardest shot to film. When you have a limited range of equipment (camera and tripod) getting a tracking shot is difficult. I decided to do the tracking shot using a  car and what better than a Range Rover. RangeRover has dynamic stability control and you can adjust the suspension so that it absorbs all bumps in the road ensuring an extra smooth ride thus an extra smooth tracking shot. To the top is the tracking shot that was later edited and features in the video. I used the Nikon D3200 as the resolution is high and stuck it out the front window of the car as it was driven along alongside the actors.

Character Shots:


To get the shots where every member of the Reservoir Dogs team is introduced we used a stationary camera set up by the wall on a fully extended tripod as seen on the left. Then I made sure the actors were in their right positions respectively after they were all given their roles. They then walked up to the camera which i later slowed down in the editing.

Cafe Scene:

The Caf é scene was probably the most disorganised part of our filming. We had booked a cafe before hand but had not been round to see it. Upon arrival at the Caf é we realised it wasn't really ideal for replicating the first scene. We were fortunate enough to come across a cafe owner who was more than willing to let us film in his cafe and we ended up doing so.

Walk Away Scene:

The scene where all members walk towards the main road was easy to film. I mean this in terms of framing and actual capture. What wasn't easy was finding the right location. In the real thing they are a fair distance away but we simply couldn't get that distance due to location practicality. We compromised by placing the camera as far back as possible and using an 18mm, so very wide frame.


Editing/Finalising Stage:

The editing stage was really the moment when we were able to really review all the footage and realise all the mistakes we had made. It was edited on Final Cut Express. the most notable but was due to the street being a one way road -something we hadn't expected- we had teh actors entering the frame from the left and not the right. We solved this by flipping the frame which using Final Cut's "flop" function. We also rotated the image anti-clockwise slightly so they appeared to be walking downhill. The only effect I applied was at the end of the prelim where I darkened the frame so the title would be better visible. I used a H1 zoom in a confined space to record the voiceover so there was o ambient sounds as the microphone is very sensitive. I googled the font that was used in the original so that I could get the font exactly the same.

Problems that occurred:

As I already mentioned we had a number of issues. The most prominent problem was the lack of actors. Having the extra two actors would of resulted in not having to use actors more than once to fill spaces and a smoother finish. Finding the music wasn't as easy as I had imagined it would be. However, after searching YouTube we found a version of the sound track and changed the pitch of it so it sounded more like the original and converted it to MP3.


EVALUATION:

At the end of every task where I have a finished product to show, I ask myself the same question: Am I happy with it? On the whole I am relatively pleased with the end result but nothing short of perfection is nothing worth boasting about. If I could redo the whole thing I could make it considerably better. One thing I would definitely do differently is ensure the background is out of focus for the character close ups and also have a camera on wheels so I can move back as the actors move forward so they don't come too close to frame. I would also ensure I have the full amount of actors necessary and film in better locations.


What I've learned?

What this preliminary has taught me is priceless. I made many mistakes on the preliminary such as poor framing due to having a stationary camera/shot and not a tracking one. I will ensure all framing in my actual thriller is done perfectly so it looks professional and not kid-like. I have also learnt a considerable amount with regards to the logistics of actually bringing everything together. Everything from getting the locations right to getting actors dressed in the appropriate attire.

I look forward to implementing all the skills I learned through acquiring the footage but also the skills I picked up by facing unexpected barriers/obstacles. Overall, this has been a very useful experience and will aid me in my actually thriller.